FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Friday - December 7, 2007

DUNN MAN SENTENCED TO LIFE IN PRISON

RALEIGH - United States Attorney George E. B. Holding announced that on December 4, 2007, United States District Judge James C. Dever sentenced TONY TAYLOR, 34, of Dunn, North Carolina, a previously convicted felon, to life in federal prison. Individuals who receive a term of life imprisonment by a federal court are not eligible for parole, and literally serve the remainder of their life in prison.

On March 12, 2007, a federal jury found TAYLOR guilty of one count of conspiracy to distribute and to possess with the intent to distribute cocaine base (crack) and six counts of actually distributing or possessing with the intent to distribute cocaine base (crack). The evidence at trial established TAYLOR had sold an individual increasing amounts of crack cocaine in six different transactions, all such sales occurring on Lincoln St. in Dunn, as well as having provided others crack cocaine on a regular basis from 2002. In all, TAYLOR distributed more than one kilogram of crack cocaine.

TAYLOR had previously been convicted of at least two felony drug offenses, and federal law mandates a life sentence in that instance. TAYLOR was a target of an investigation dubbed “Operation Taylorville,” which was a collaborative effort among several law enforcement agencies, to include the Dunn Police Department, the Harnett County Drug Task Force, and the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation.

News releases are available on the U. S. Attorney’s web page at www.usdoj.gov/usao/nce within 48 hours of release.